Blyndfold

Inspiration

The average adult makes 35,000 conscious decisions per day. Making decisions leads to decision fatigue, which is the deteriorating quality of decisions made by an individual over a period of time. We want to improve lives by removing the need to make a few decisions - mainly those around deciding what to eat.

What it does

Blyndfold.me is an Amazon Echo skill that makes the decision of where to eat for you - without telling you. Users decide what kind of food they want, how much they want to spend, and how far they want to travel.

Our service takes that data and uses it to find the perfect restaurant. However, instead of telling the user what it is, we call a Lyft to pick them up. This way, they do not know where they will be eating until they arrive!

This is a fun way to pick what you are doing or where you are going, with friends and family. Perfect for a spontaneous date night or just hanging out with friends.

How I built it

There are two main components to the our app:

Alexa Skill

Backend Service

We used a NodeJS backend and integrated with Lyft, Google Places, and Twilio APIs.

Challenges I ran into

We ran into some challenges with authenticating to the Lyft API and proper key storage.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We are proud of setting up an Alexa skill and integrating with a custom backend.

What I learned

We learned about Alexa skills, Lambda, and using third party services.

What's next for Blyndfold

Integrate with TripAdvisor to find local attractions

Uber support

"Address-only" mode, if you would like to drive yourself

Integrate with delivery services to have food delivered - as a surprise, of course!

Set pre-defined modes and preferences (e.g. Taco Tuesday mode, which finds you a restaraunt that serves tacos)